Peaceful United is a foundation incorporated by Coco van der Horst (1988) and Judith van der Horst (1980). Not only are we cousins, we have a lot in common! We both can chat until the sun comes up, we both adore falafel, we both love sports but most importantly, we both want to do our little bit to make the world better place.

Every idea starts with someone, or with more people, who suddenly realise, we want to something, how can we make it happen? At Judith’s birthday dinner in 2016 it suddenly came together – we were talking about Syrian refugees and how we both wanted to get involved. But neither of us was really sure what we wanted or could do. After chatting for hours we had a lightbulb moment and realised we wanted to organise a football tournament for Syrian refugees in Jordan to promote human and children’s rights! Why Jordan? Because contrary to popular belief the vast majority of refugees are hosted in the region. And with that…. Peaceful United was born!

We are quite lucky that our professional backgrounds fit flawlessly. Coco is marketing expert and football fanatic and has organized football tournaments in the Netherlands. Judith is a human rights lawyer who implemented various human rights projects in Sudan, South Sudan and Kenya. Our combined experience and expertise make us great partners to work when combining sports & human rights.